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The Hermeneutics of John Cassian in Conference 14 Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies Vol. 59 (2018) Nos. 1–4, pp. 263–275 The Monastic Life as Exegesis: The Hermeneutics of John Cassian in Conference 14 Thomas Deutsch Today, faith in the revelation of scripture is not a prerequi- site for becoming a successful scripture scholar. Although many contemporary scholars consider unbelief a prerequisite for analyzing and interpreting scriptures unbiasedly,1 the monk John Cassian (d. circa 435 C.E.) would see such lack of faith as detrimental to the entire process of understanding the scrip- tures. This divergence of opinion results in part because these contemporary scholars and Cassian view the end of scriptural interpretation differently. While a contemporary agnostic scholar strives in his or her exegetical work primarily for eru- dition, originality, and positive peer reception, Cassian wants to unlock the meaning of scriptures for the sake of living a life of unceasing prayer and encounter with God. 1 D.Z. Phillips describes the hermeneutical situation today in terms of a false dichotomy between a hermeneutics of recollection, which presupposes belief on the part of the interpreter in the religious texts being analyzed, and a her- meneutics of suspicion, which sees the unbelief of the interpreter as his or her greatest tool for accessing the meaning of the religious text, since the re- ligious worldview of the text hides or warps the truth of the text. As a middle position between these two extremes, Phillips offers the hermeneutic of con- templation, which allows the interpreter to accept the religious worldview of sacred texts for the purpose of interpretation without actually believing in the worldview presupposed by the text. D.Z. Phillips, Religion and the Herme- neutics of Contemplation (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001). As this paper hopes to show, Cassian’s hermeneutic denies the possibility of both the hermeneutics of suspicion and contemplation. 264 Thomas Deutsch To even begin such an endeavor requires faith and virtuous living. In his Conferences, especially Conference 14, Cassian instructs monks on how to acquire the virtuous life, a life which both allows for and is strengthened by faithful interpre- tation of scripture. Instead of juxtaposing orthodoxy and ortho- praxy, he sees both as necessary stages in the process of inter- pretation, informed and supported by the monastic community, which lead the monk to encounter the ineffability of God and become a person in whom others can share the experience of this encounter. In Conference 14, Cassian describes the division of spiri- tual knowledge he learned from Abba Nesteros, one of the ex- perienced spiritual masters he met during his time in the Egyptian desert. This knowledge includes both practical and theoretical elements: according to Nesteros, the practical side of spiritual knowledge helps a monk to recognize his sin and live virtuously, while the theoretical aspect of spiritual know- ledge deals with “the contemplation of things divine and the awareness of very sacred meanings.”2 The monk can achieve theoretical knowledge without practical knowledge only to a limited extent, requiring the practical side of spiritual know- 2 John Cassian, Conferences, trans. Colm Luibheid (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1985), 155. Future references will include the conference number and chapter followed by its page number in the Luibheid translation. When cited in that way, the former citation would be Conf. 14, 1; 155. For a critical edi- tion of the Latin original of the Conferences along with a French introduc- tion, translation, and notes, see Jean Cassien, Conférences, vol. 1 (I–VII) and 2 (VIII–XVII), trans. Eugène Pichery, Sources Chrétiennes 42 and 54 (Paris: Cerf, 2008 and 2009). Though Cassian attributes this distinction between the practical and theoretical elements of spiritual knowledge to Nesteros, the division reveals the influence of Evagrius of Pontus. Due to Origen’s influence on Evagrius, Cassian, who left Egypt because of the Origenist controversy, never referen- ces either theologian by name. Bernard McGinn, The Presence of God: A History of Western Christian Mysticism, vol. 1, The Foundations of Mysti- cism (New York: Crossroad, 1994), 218–219. For a detailed analysis of Evagrius’ influence on Cassian, see McGinn The Presence of God, 218–223, 225. For a summary of Evagrius’ thought, see ibid., 144–157, and Andrew Louth, The Origins of the Christian Mystical Tradition: From Plato to Denys, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007), 97–110. The Monastic Life as Exegesis 265 ledge before he can possess authentic theoria.3 According to Nesteros, “[a]nyone wishing to master contemplation must, with all zeal and energy, acquire first the practical side” be- cause “[t]here are two arranged and separate stages by which human lowliness can reach up to the sublime;” he who spurns the first stage of practical knowledge “does not avoid the stains of sin” and “strives vainly for a sight of God.”4 For Cassian, following Nesteros, intellectual pride defeats the purpose of scripture reading because the monk aspires to truly know the meaning of the sacred texts in order to be united with Christ as his disciple, a goal that requires both humility and help from the Holy Spirit.5 In gaining practical knowledge before developing in virtue, the monk first recognizes his sins and learns how to overcome them. He must deal with what is “lower” and in- terior as the first step on the road to virtue; only then does the contemplation of that which is “higher” and exterior become possible.6 Yet, recognizing and rooting out sin presents the monk with more difficulty than acquiring virtue.7 In order to 3 At the beginning of Conference 9, Cassian distinguishes virtue and prayer in a way analogous to this distinction between practical and theoretical spiri- tual knowledge. While “virtues are the prerequisite foundation of prayer,” they “cannot be effected without it.” Conf. 9, 2; 101. Similarly, without theo- ria, practical spiritual knowledge lacks its ultimate purpose. 4 Conf. 14, 2; 156. 5 “For it is one thing to be a skilled talker and a shining speaker. It is some- thing else to enter into the very heart and core of heavenly utterances, to con- template with the heart’s purest gaze the deep and hidden mysteries. This is not something to be possessed by humanistic lore and worldly erudition. It will be gained only by purity of heart and through the illumination of the Holy Spirit.” Conf. 14, 9; 163. 6 Conf. 14, 3; 156. 7 Ibid. Cassian gives an allegorical reading of Jeremiah 1: 10 (“Look, today I am setting you over nations and over kingdoms to tear up and destroy, to scatter and overthrow, to build and to plant”) to support this claim: God gives Israel four negative tasks, which represent the destruction of sin, be- fore performing the two positive tasks of building and planting, which repre- sent the attainment of virtue. Rebecca Harden Weaver explains what Cassian is attempting here and in his Institutes as astutely psychological: “the origin of sin and virtue lay in the thoughts. It was thus necessary to learn to recog- nize in oneself the kinds of thinking that distorted one’s perceptions. These logismoi twisted the heart so that it could not receive the truth about itself, its 266 Thomas Deutsch accomplish this task, the monk needs help from others in the community, primarily his abba;8 if he desires to know God, then he must enter the monastic community in order to “live with others who have the same intention and the same aspira- tion. Over the years in that community [he] must learn to prac- tice prayer, and the moral life that is necessary to prayer,” and, only after that might the monk retire to his hermitage where “the silence and the remoteness allow [him] to listen more con- tinuously to the Word of God and to come into His presence.”9 Thus, in Conference 14, Nesteros warns Cassian not to dis- regard his teachers and to allow his intellectual pride to stand in the way of his development: neighbor, or its God.” Rebecca Harden Weaver, “Access to Scripture: Expe- riencing the Text,” Interpretation 52 (1998): 369. 8 Christopher Kelly argues that within scripture the monk finds models on which he can base his life and thus grow in virtue. But the monk comes to scripture through his abba. Kelly writes, “The monk first encounters the sacred text in the person of the abba. With guidance from such men, he with- draws into the chrysalis stage of monastic discipline, during which time his self-centered orientation is supplanted by the immanent sense of scripture.” Christopher J. Kelly, Cassian’s Conferences: Scriptural interpretation and the Monastic Ideal (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2012), 97. Catherine M. Chin, by using the inherently social aspects of distributive cognition to explain Cassian’s depiction of the relationship between indivi- dual monks to their larger communities, builds on the point that Cassian, in- stead of juxtaposing the individual and the community, sees them as integral to one another. Catherine M. Chin, “Cassian, Cognition, and the Common Life,” in Ascetic Culture : Essays in Honor of Philip Rousseau, ed. Blake Leyerle and Robin Darling Young (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2013), 147–166. In this sense, without his abba, the monk cannot truly come to know his sin and what he lacks. 9 Owen Chadwick, introduction to the Conferences, by John Cassian, trans. Colm Luibheid (Mahwah: Paulist Press, 1985), 5. In a similar vein, Weaver notes that Cassian understands contemplation in the communal context of the abba as the monk’s teacher even though at the beginning of the Conferences Cassian focuses on the solitude of the monk in the act of contemplation: “The role of the contemplative had become one of service to the community as a teacher of the Bible.
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